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The Federal Trade Commission is suing three companies that have been making automated recorded phone calls to sell “worthless” credit card interest reduction programs, charging customers an up front fee as high as $1,495 and delivering zilcho.

“According to the three FTC complaints, Economic Relief Technologies, LLC, Dynamic Financial Group (U.S.A.) Inc., and JPM Accelerated Services (JPM), and related defendants made illegal pre-recorded robocalls to consumers, using names like “card services,” “credit card services” or “account services.” The robocalls allegedly claimed the defendants’ services could lower the interest rate on consumers’ credit cards. In each case, consumers who pressed 1 after hearing the automated call were transferred to live telemarketers who allegedly misrepresented that consumers could dramatically lower the rates on their credit card.

The telemarketers also said consumers would save thousands of dollars in a short period of time by lowering their interest rates and would be able to pay off their debts faster – for an up-front fee ranging from $495 to $1,495. The defendants then falsely stated that if consumers did not save a “guaranteed” amount – typically $2,500 or more – they could get a full refund of the up-front fee. However, after securing the fee, the defendants allegedly did not negotiate lower rates on behalf of consumers and provided few refunds to those who were dissatisfied with the service.”

Here’s the deal. Every time consumers get ripped off by sleazeballs using telemarketing technology, it makes all of our jobs harder. Getting robbed on the phone is certainly preferable to getting mugged on the street, but that is little consolation to these scam victims.

What’s more astounding is that companies are still choosing to use pre-recorded sales calls at all. Since Sept. 1, 2009, recorded sales pitches have been illegal with the exception of a few rare instances — such as the customer previously requesting such calls in advance (like that’s gonna happen!)

The reality is that sales calls are about building personal relationships and talking to machines is a total turnoff.

With the Mojo Dialer lead management software and the Mojo Dialer power dialer technology, you project the friendly human interaction as your first impression — even on the first hello. No robotic recordings.

The Mojo Dialer wiith lead management will make 250-300 calls an hour, constantly feeding you the live customers as they pick up!

Moreover, with no robot interaction, your sales staff will encounter far fewer hostile responses — making their work shifts less stressful and more productive.

Now if we could just invent a device to weed out the unscrupulous scam artists!

Deserved or not — and we think NOT — the telemarketing professional is burdened with many negative stereotypes. Particularly the image of the telemarketer as a short-term, unfocused employee who is just biding time for another “better” job to come along.

The reality is that telemarketing is simply a sales tool — a way to more efficiently sell your products and expand your market base. If your product is exciting, if it solves a problem or even entertains your prospective client, the scripted call can easily transform into a fun conversation.

But back to the stereotype that phone sales is the kind of job that nobody wants, like say cleaning out a chicken coop (no offense to chicken coop cleaners). Turns out that now more than ever, telemarketing careers are becoming appealing to more college graduates and professionals in other industries.

This year, Time Warner Cable in Milwaukee built a huge call center dedicated to retaining the company’s TV, phone and Internet customers — and to convincing them to go for service upgrades. Here’s how the Business Journal of Milwaukee explains the decision to create a new state-of-the-art telemarketing center:

“Cable companies have been losing video service subscribers in recent years, but are capturing more revenue by selling profitable broadband and phone services, said Chris Marangi, an analyst with Gabelli & Associates, New York City. With satellite television and services like AT&T’s U-Verse taking cable customers, the cable firms have had to become creative in pursuing subscribers via telemarketing and other strategies, he said.

“They’re being aggressive about courting subscribers,” Marangi said.

While telemarketing jobs have a reputation of being low paid and their work force transient, Time Warner officials are proud of its benefits and workplace environment. The Time Warner positions require a high school diploma, but many of the new hires have college degrees and post-high school training, (TW vice president Bev) Greenberg said.”

When your company needs to be aggressive about courting new customers — and keeping the ones you have — it makes sense to give your phone sales team the sales tools they need to be most productive.

For starters, Mojo lead management software and power dialers ensure that your telemarketers are never wasting their time with busy signals, answering machines or hang-ups. Our power dialer technology ensures that your sales reps spend 100 percent of their time talking to live people. And after all, it is live people, and not answering machines, who make purchasing decisions!

And our Triple Line Power Dialer is so fast, it lets you hear the first “hello,” not the third or fourth, so your prospective customer isn’t turned off by those awkward delays that telegraph that a sales pitch is on the way.